


(I'll Carry You) Home

by antigrav_vector



Series: Assorted Gift Ficlets [26]
Category: Captain America (MCU), Iron Man (MCU), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Everything is Beautiful and Nothing Hurts, Hurt/Comfort, Injured Tony, M/M, Some Crack, set outside canon, silliness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-08
Updated: 2019-04-08
Packaged: 2020-01-06 18:15:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18393737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/antigrav_vector/pseuds/antigrav_vector
Summary: Continuation oflast year's silliness. Steve and Nat find Tony crashed in the desert sands and carry him home.





	(I'll Carry You) Home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Veldeia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Veldeia/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Looking for You (I'm Lost) in the Desert](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14423682) by [Veldeia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Veldeia/pseuds/Veldeia). 



> Posted (unbeta'ed) a day late because I'm a derp and meant to do this yesterday but then ended up cleaning the house instead because my parents are coming over. So I'm late despite having this ready for literal weeks, oops.
> 
> Sorry, vel, but happy birthday. ^^;;
> 
> ETA: Apparently I derped harder than I thought and am somehow early? Heh. Oh well.

Seeing Steve come half-stumbling down the dune toward him, laughing, had Tony breathing a heavy (but silent) sigh of relief.

"Just what's so funny?" He demanded, trying to get JARVIS to unlock the armour's joints. 

"A camel traffic control system?" Steve asked him, his gloved hands coming down on the armour's sand-scuffed panels and checking them over.

"Obviously they need one," Tony told him archly, "seeing as they have none."

"Sure," Steve agreed with him, audibly humouring him. "Are you hurt?"

Making a face, Tony debated telling him.

"No life-threatening injuries, Captain," JARVIS took the choice out of his hands, and Tony knew he needed to reprogram a few subroutines. "But Sir will need medical attention and assistance in reaching the quinjet."

Steve looked torn between worry and frustration. "The quinjet's also not flight worthy but I guess we'll have to make do. It got us safely onto the ground, and we do still have some first aid supplies aboard."

Natasha picked that moment to appear at Steve's side. "Let's get you back to the jet, then, Iron Man," she said.

Steve nodded. "I'll take him, Widow," he decided, making Tony let his head fall back against the inside of his helmet and groan.

He hated getting carried around like an invalid.

Getting picked up _hurt_. Tony bit the inside of his cheek to keep from making any pained noises that JARVIS would ensure the team got to hear.

His ankle was very probably sprained, as was his left wrist. His ribs hurt in that way that Tony was fairly sure meant at least one was cracked or broken.

Thankfully the trek back to the jet wasn't a long one and didn't leave him grumpily staring up into the brightly sunny sky for more than ten minutes. Every step Steve took jarred his injuries and made nausea do its best to rise up and choke him. Tony focused on breathing evenly and doing airspeed calculations. He'd had more than enough of staring up at the sun and worrying already for one day, waiting to find out whether the team had even survived that initial missile attack, and he sure as fuck needed a distraction from the pain he was currently hiding from his team. 

Then, almost before he was mentally prepared for it, Steve's feet hit the distinctively angled ramp of the quinjet, and the bright sun wasn't blinding him anymore. 

"We've got him, Hawkeye," Steve said, and knelt to gently put Tony on the floor of the jet on his back. 

Tony couldn't help the pained grunt that escaped him, when his back met the floor. 

"JARVIS?" Steve asked, already reaching for the manual armour release switches, "What are we looking at?"

"Based on initial scans," JARVIS replied before Tony could mute him, "soft tissue injuries to the left wrist and ankle, and two cracked ribs."

That wasn't actually so bad but Steve bit back on a wince, and nodded. "Right. That armour needs to come off, Tony."

The way Steve was worrying, you'd think he'd been hurt a lot worse. "Steve," he said firmly and caught his lover's eyes, "I'll be fine."

With a silent shake of his head, Steve stubbornly kept working him out of the armour. He'd hit the manual releases as Tony had spoken, and now he was removing the modular pieces one by one.

Clint rolled his eyes at them and left the quinjet's cargo bay with a shrug. "Good luck, Stark," he called over his shoulder. "You're going to be mother henned for a month."

Natasha made an amused sound and joined him.

Steve's expression went mulish, and he kept working. Tony was nearly free of the armour now. Only the gauntlets were left. "It's not serious now," he acknowledged, "based on JARVIS' diagnosis. But you keep aggravating your injuries because you think you have to."

Tony tried to take a deep breath and bit down on a wince as the sharp ache shuddered through him in a very visceral way. "Cracked ribs heal in like a month without intervention. You know that as well as I do. The soft tissue injuries are more annoying."

That got Steve scowling. "Don't remind me."

Laughing hurt, but Tony couldn't help the chuckle that pulled out of him, and the relief that he saw roll over Steve like a wave set his annoyance to melting away. Reaching up to put his now unarmoured hand against Steve's cheek, he replied, "if anything, I should be the one worrying over you, right now. You just got shot out of the sky without the benefit of armour to take the hit for you"

"That's old hat," Steve shot back. "At least this time I didn't end up under ice."

Tony shield away from that thought with a wince. How Steve could joke about that without any kind of problems was a mystery to him. But then, he did his damnedest to do much the same when he thought about Afghanistan or the Wormhole. "Do me a favour and try not to do it again?"

"I will if you will," Steve countered, stubborn as ever, bringing his hand up, still in its bright red glove, to tangle it with Tony's and hold onto him tightly. 

"Guess I can work with that," Tony agreed after a beat and let himself relax against the hard metal of the quinjet floor.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Wherever I Am (With You)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18619726) by [Veldeia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Veldeia/pseuds/Veldeia)




End file.
